The international community's experience
of humanitarian crises in northern Iraq has centered on the Kurdish refugee
emergency of 1991, i.e., a sudden, massive population displacement. This
experience continues to shape current humanitarian planning for Iraq, despite
that the situation in 2002-2003 is very different from 1991. Moreover,
the key lesson of 1991 -- the successful effort to rapidly enable people
to return home before they became an entrenched refugee population -- is
being overlooked by relief planners.

The Famine Early Warning Systems Network (FEWS NET) issues periodic emergencies when population groups are now, or will soon become, extremely food insecure, unable to meet their consumption needs. These groups have already exhausted their strategies for acquiring food and face imminent famine.

PR 02/129
Rome, 17 December 2002 - Some
40 million people in sub-Saharan Africa are threatened by severe food shortages
and a major humanitarian crisis is deepening in southern Africa, the UN
Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) said today.